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Guns to fall silent in Kashmir
25/11/2003 11:46 - (SA)
New Delhi - The Indian and Pakistani armies will stop firing across the disputed Kashmir frontier from midnight on Tuesday in a further easing of tensions between the nuclear-armed neighbours, officials said.
The two armies - which fire machine guns and automatic rifles at each other almost daily - will observe a cease-fire along the international border, or Line of Control, that divides the Himalayan region between the South Asian nations, said a statement from India's External Affairs Ministry.
They will also stop firing along the frontier at the Siachen Glacier, the world's highest battleground, it said, adding that the move has been timed to coincide with the Eid-al-Fitr festival that ends the Islamic holy month of Ramadan.
"Directors-general of military operations of India and Pakistan, in the course of their weekly conversation today, agreed to observe a cease-fire with effect from midnight tonight," said the statement.
India's statement followed Sunday's announcement by Pakistani Prime Minister Zafarullah Khan Jamali that his country's soldiers would stop firing unilaterally along the border beginning on Eid al-Fitr.
It was not made clear how long the cease-fire would last.
Kashmir has been the source of two of three wars between Pakistan and India since the South Asian rivals split in 1947 upon gaining independence from Britain. Most of those killed in fighting across the frontier have been civilians.
India contends that Pakistan arms, funds and trains Islamic militants who cross the 1972 cease-fire line to launch attacks in India's part of the region.
Pakistan denies it gives material aid to the militants but says it supports their 14-year fight to merge the Indian portion of Jammu-Kashmir with Pakistan or win its independence. More than 65 000 people have died since the insurgency began in 1989.
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